


His Star

by ThePandaPopo



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Canon Compliant, Everyone Is Alive, F!Byleth, F/F, F/M, Golden Deer Route, In laws, M/M, Post canon, verdant wind
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:41:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25929802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThePandaPopo/pseuds/ThePandaPopo
Summary: The newly crowned Almyran king is eager to bust open Fodlan's Throat and herald in a new age of peace. However, first things first, he needs to make an honest woman out of his betrothed - who just so happens to be low-key terrified of meeting her in-laws.
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius & Sylvain Jose Gautier, Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier, Marianne von Edmund & Hilda Valentine Goneril, Marianne von Edmund/Hilda Valentine Goneril, My Unit | Byleth & Claude von Riegan, My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan, Raphael Kirsten/Bernadetta von Varley
Comments: 3
Kudos: 50





	1. Illness

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my Tumblr @ThePandaPopo on July 23rd, 2020
> 
> This is my first FE fic in over ten years. The last time I wrote anything for FE was back in FE7 which, to this day, is my second favourite game of all time.
> 
> I have been on a Claudeth binge lately and since it is our favourite deer’s birthday tomorrow, I thought I would try my hand at a fic.
> 
> This is most likely going to be a multi chapter fic as I am spinning the plotline in my head as we speak, but whether or not that plot bunny makes it to paper is a different story.
> 
> Want to know my progress on fics? Check me out on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/PopoWrites)
> 
> Sometimes [Tumblr](https://thepandapopo.tumblr.com/) will see a fic update before ao3, so be sure to follow me there as well!

“ _Professor_ , you need to rest!”

For someone so demure and dainty looking, Marianne is deceptively strong. Though, Byleth thinks absently as she lets her former student push her back down onto her large 4 poster bed, she shouldn’t be so surprised since she’s seen even Raphael himself bend to the gentle bishop’s will in the odd instances that he sustains a critical enough injury to land himself in the healer’s tent.

“Don’t worry, Professor. I’m sure Seteth will be able to hold down the fort while you recover.” Leonie says from her place at the foot of the bed. Despite the fact that the war has been over for nearly 6 months, her lance is still clipped neatly to her belt, next to her sword scabbard - close enough within reach to attack on a moment’s notice.

Since the end of the war, Leonie had taken it upon herself to act as the new Queen’s Head of Royal Guard. When Byleth had questioned the orange haired girl about her decision, she was merely met with a grin and a simple “ _I would be a terrible apprentice to Captain Jeralt if I let anything happen to his only child_.”

“I’m… sorry.” Though the words themselves are not strange on her tongue, the unfamiliar dryness of her mouth and stuffed nose make Byleth sound weaker and more hesitant than she would have liked.

Leonie snorts, “you don’t have to apologize for catching a cold, Professor. Especially one due to _stress_. Despite what I think of you when you’re on the battlefield, you really are just a person like anyone else - of course you’re bound to get sick every now and again.”

Still, Byleth broods silently as she watches the blue haired healer usher her other student out the bedroom door, she has never gotten sick in her entire life until now and it just seems a tad bit _unfair_.

Fusing with the progenitor goddess has several advantages, but unfortunately it seems like being immune to illnesses is not one of them.

As her eyelids begin to lose the fight against consciousness, Byleth cannot help but let her mind wander longingly until she falls asleep dreaming of beautiful emerald eyes and a crooked grin that shines brighter than the dawn.

—-

It only takes one week of being bed ridden before everything goes to hell in a handbasket.

Byleth is finally starting to feel well enough to stand up without feeling like she has ingested a vial of Claude’s infamous dizziness poison, when the scouts return with a report that the remnants of the Imperial army have joined forces with Those who Slither in the Dark and are marching for Derdrui, the country’s new capital.

It does not take a tactical genius to figure out that they are coming for the newly appointed Queen and Archbishop of the United Land of Fodlan.

Urgent messengers are sent out to all the nearby houses, requesting any available troops they can spare without leaving themselves vulnerable. It’s almost laughable the pitiful number of men that show up to help fight, but the arrival of all her golden deer is enough to raise Byleth’s morale and hope that she can conquer this disadvantaged fight without her schemer by her side.

Despite the protests from her students - _former students, she corrects herself_ \- Byleth steels herself and leads the meager army at her disposal in a defensive formation. This is her duty, after all. Without her, troop morale would falter and that in itself can be the deciding factor in a battle. Additionally, though she has not used it in several months and truly, she does believe in all her students’ skills, Byleth cannot help the unease that creeps up her throat when she thinks about her precious deer on the battlefield without her Divine Pulse. She has fought so hard to make sure they lived to see the peaceful world Claude and her dreamed of, that it would seem like a cruel joke only for them to fall now.

Even sick, the Ashen Demon earns her reputation. Fells of enemies fall to the Sword of the Creator as it burns with power, whipping around its wielder like a snake striking with deadly precision at the enemy’s weakness. Byleth refuses to let any enemies get close to the city. Her people have already been ravaged by war. They deserve _peace,_ not another battle at their front step.

Hilda is somewhere to her left swinging Freikugel and cleaving through enemies with all the difficulty of a hot knife slicing through butter. Byleth is tempted to relocate the pink haired girl to the back line to act as a final barrier, but she knows that those orders will fall on deaf ears.

_“If you insist on going out there Professor, then I have to come and make sure you don’t die. Can you imagine what Claude would say if he came back to find you dead? He would mope for the next century!”_

Ignatz and Lysithea are further back providing cover with their long ranged attacks. Arrows and black magic rain from the sky, piercing through unsuspecting enemies and carving a path for Byleth’s battalion to advance and cut through the ranks of the enemy.

Somewhere to her right, she can hear Raphael’s battle cries above the cacophony of sounds. Judging by his sheer volume, Byleth knows that he is doing well despite being far outnumbered. Besides, the brawler is accompanied by Lorenz and Bernadetta, and while Lorenz specializes in black magics, he knows enough healing spells to keep them afloat. Plus, no matter how timid she is off the battlefield, Bernadetta is a force to be reckoned with when protecting her loved ones. Especially her mountain of a husband.

Marianne, Leonie, Felix, Ingrid, Seteth and Flayn are scattered elsewhere to protect against the enemies from crushing them in from both sides, but as the battle wages on, it becomes more and more apparent that their ranks are thinning and those that still stand are beginning to feel the fatigue of being outnumbered three to one.

The battlefield has long since warped into a jigsaw of cracked earth and chasms, courtesy of some nasty earth spells from Those Who Slither In the Dark. Where there should be rolling plains leading out onto the salty water of the ocean, there are now steep cliffs of jagged rocks jutting out of the ground, and despite her best efforts, Byleth eventually finds herself cornered on the precipice of one such cliff.

**_It can’t end like this._ **

Another enemy falls to her sword and Byleth barely has time to parry an oncoming arrow before another wave of nausea assaults her body.

She knows she’s probably burning up right now. Mint green strands of hair are matted to her skin with dirt and sweat, and the pounding behind her eyes is growing increasingly difficult to ignore. Byleth is pretty sure that had it not been for her father hammering in years of battle instincts into her, she would have had her head lopped off ages ago.

Despite how much she tries to will herself to stay in that cool, collected mindset that has won her numerous battles, Byleth cannot stop the tightness in her chest that accompanies the tears of frustration accumulating at the corner of her eyes.

She wanted to see Claude again. To feel his arms around her. To fall asleep to the steady pounding of his heart that seemed to inexplicably speed up every time she let her body melt into his. To let herself drown in the scent of pine needles and spices.

She could try using the Divine Pulse, but where would she rewind to? A few minutes would not be enough to make a drastic enough decision to turn the tide in their favor.

_**It’s not fair.** _

Goddess. She is so tired. But she cannot give up. Not when she has a promise to keep.

_“I love you. With everything I am. And the next time we see each other… it will be at the dawn of a whole new world. A peaceful, happy world.”_

_**Claude…** _

The ground beneath her feet teeters and he sky is suddenly above her. It is a brilliant blue with fluffy white clouds and even though she knows she is falling, she cannot help but be reminded of the first time Claude invited her out on his wyvern and they spent the afternoon soaring and diving through the air on a beautiful day just like this.

**_Claude… I’m sorry I couldn’t keep our promise…_ **

She thinks it is a trick of her mind, but right as Byleth feels her consciousness slipping away, she hears his voice one last time crying out her name with such fear and anguish.

Then, there was nothing.

—-

**_“BYLETH!”_ **

Claude feels his heart stop and clench painfully as the familiar black and green figure tumbles off the edge of a jagged cliff.

He is shooting across the battlefield on his wyvern’s back before he can even spare a thought to how absolutely reckless it is to fly so low in the range of archers.

Behind him, he vaguely registers his generals shouting at him in alarm and Nader barking out orders to support the retreating Fodlan forces.

All he can think about right now is getting to His Star in time.

Later, he will wonder to himself if perhaps he might have the power to pause time as well, because although it was probably less than 4 seconds, Claude swears that the world around him slowed as all of his senses honed in on his one goal.

**_Please, goddess, let me reach her in time._ **

—

To those who participated in the Final battle with Those Who Slither in the Dark, they would recall vividly the moment when a loud battle cry rang out from the east heralding the arrival of the Almyran army.

They would also recount the arrow of white and gold that shot across the battlefield towards the Queen whom had made her last stand on the edge of a cliff before fainting from exhaustion and tumbling down to the depths below.

Above the din of weapons clashing and cries of agony rose a single name, cried out with such fear and panic that even those who knew not whom the shout belonged to, felt their hearts clench painfully with the raw emotion.

Although not many could say for certain what happened next, all the surviving Fodlan soldiers would recall shortly thereafter seeing their former leader, Claude von Riegan, atop his white wyvern loosing arrow after arrow on the lingering enemies with such brutal efficiency that reminded everyone exactly how he had ended the war.

When the fighting ceases and casualties are tallied, fear for their Queen runs rampant through the soldiers. For those who have had the privilege of fighting under the combined leadership of Claude, the master tactician, and Byleth, the Ashen Demon, they know how strong the bond is between the two, and although they have their doubts, they allow themselves to let their worries melt away when they see Claude exit the medical tent with a look of such knee wobbling relief that he has to lean on a nearby wall to stop from collapsing.


	2. Proposals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Claude proposes a vacation to Byleth which may or may not be stress free, and may or may not include going back to Almyra with him so that he can court her properly. 
> 
> OR
> 
> The one where Claude schemes to take his star home so that he can finally get started on his plans to make an honest woman out of her… and also get his parents off his back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross posted from my Tumblr @ThePandaPopo

Of all the things Claude expected to come back to, Byleth falling off a cliff was not one of them.

In fact, after the first time he watched her fall off a cliff following the Battle of Garreg Mach, he never wanted to see it ever again. So when he was faced with his greatest fear for the second time - _no no no, she couldn’t leave him again_ \- he had not hesitated to throw caution to the wind and abandon his position at the head of his army. He had dug his heels into Zahra’s flank and as always, the white wyvern was on the same page as her master, flying faster than she had ever flown before towards the falling queen.

Claude was used to any physical contact with Byleth feeling electric, like little shocks of pleasure shooting from his nerves and sending shivers down his spine, but when he caught her in his arms, he was alarmed by how _hot_ her skin felt even through the thick leather of his gloves.

It was clear that Byleth was ill. Extremely ill. And yet she pushed herself to her very limits, standing at the front lines with her soldiers to show them that no matter what, she was with them because she believed in a world of peace.

She believed in his dream.

Suddenly, the fear that gripped his heart mere moments ago gives way to a fiery hot rage that burns through his body.

Byleth has done enough for Fodlan. She has fought countless battles, pushed her body to the very limits, and even carried the burden of having the powers of a goddess ( _”Teach, you’re joking, right? What do you mean you can turn back time?” “It is exactly what I said, Claude.”_ ).

And now these stragglers and remnants of the Imperial army and Those Who Slither in the Dark come once more to try and revive their warped plans?

There are many things that Byleth deserves, Claude thinks, and being able to lay in bed recovering from a cold without worrying about crazy delusional dark mages is probably near the top of that list.

So when the newly crowned King finally makes it to Marianne and entrusts his _~~secret~~_ fiance to her care, he no longer has his usual mask of cheerful indifference. Instead, storm clouds roil and darken his visage, verdant eyes sharp and blazing with cold, calculating determination.

Claude doesn’t remember how many enemies he shoots down that day. But he does know that it isn’t enough to quell the fury that simmers beneath his skin.

—-

It is four days after the battle before Byleth finally regains consciousness.

Much to his chagrin, Claude is not there by her side when she rejoins the land of the conscious. In the aftermath of the battle, he resolves to step up and help Byleth with some of her duties while she is recovering. Which is exactly how Claude has found himself in the middle of a dreadfully exasperating conversation with Count Gloucester going over resource allocation for the umpteenth time. Thankfully, the servant chooses this time to burst through the door with the news.

“Your majesty!! She’s awake!”

The words are barely registering in his brain before he is moving, hastily throwing half-hearted apologies towards the clearly disgruntled Count, and rushing out the door.

He makes it to her room in record time. And he knows this because he has timed how long it takes to get to her room from any location in the castle, just in case he needs to get to her quickly.

Sitting upright against a mountain of pillows and bathed in the sunlight from the open terrace doors, Byleth is a vision for sore eyes.

He opens his mouth to speak and cannot help but slip back into the playful banter that he is so used to.

“Teach, we really gotta talk about you and cliffs. I don’t think it’s working out in your favor.”

Claude distantly wonders if maybe he should have said something more romantic, or even just a simply inquiry about her health, but those options don’t sit right with him.

She loves him for who he is, and that includes his old habits and light quips.

She is staring at him like he is a ghost, and really, he cannot blame her. The bed sinks a little with his weight and he reaches out to brush a stray lock of mint so that he can see those beautiful eyes that he missed so dearly. 

It has been a long six and a half months since he left her at the top of the Goddess Tower. Probably even more shocking yet, he has since ascended the Almyran throne and that feat itself is quite evident from the brightly coloured and extravagant robes that he now dons on a daily basis.

“What’s the matter, Teach? Cat got your- _oof!_ ”

She crashes into him without warning and he is immediately reminded of how solidly built she actually is. Byleth is a fighter first and foremost, after all. Claude should have known that a few months behind a desk tending to paperwork wouldn’t have been enough to deteriorate the wall of lean muscle she has built over years of mercenary work.

“I… You… you’re really here?”

Oh, Goddess. He has missed her voice.

His arms snake around her, one coming to a rest across her lower back, pulling her smaller form closer to him as the other hand snakes its way into her hair. 

Lips against her temple, he gifts her with a gentle kiss before humming his reply against her skin.

“I am, my love. I’m sorry I made you wait so long.”

Neither of them can bring themselves to separate, not when this moment feels so much like a dream that could dissolve at any second. Instead, they trade quiet whispers of affection that do not even come close to reflecting the longing and yearning they have experienced since they parted ways.

The sun is beginning to fall below the horizon by the time they manage to pull apart for longer than a heartbeat. Byleth has long since scooted over and pulled Claude under the covers so that they can lay side by side rather than perched uncomfortably at the edge of her bed.

He lets out a pleasant hum when her fingers begin carding through his hair, slender fingers parting his thick brown hair and smoothing it down the back of his head.

“So…” 

He knows that tone. He’s been on the receiving end of it multiple times, mostly back in his schooldays when she catches him red handed with a vial of his latest experiment uncorked and ready to pour into someone’s meal.

“ _King_ now, is it?”

“Er… yeah.” He ignores the urge to scratch his neck sheepishly and opts to bury his face in her shoulder, inhaling the sweet scent of blade oil and jasmine that is unique to Byleth.

“King _Khalid_.”

Ah crap.

He lifts his sheepish expression to meet her narrowed eyes, “By, you have to believe me when I say I was going to tell you. But I had to sort a lot of things out first.” 

He brings their hands up under the fading sunlight and verdant eyes shift to look at their intertwined fingers.“You know already that I am part Almyran. And I told you before I left that I had some…royal connections -”

“I believe you described them as ‘ _insignificant_ ’.” As usual, her memory and mind are as sharp as her sword and he knows that he cannot weasel his way out of this situation.

“Haha… did I say that? I mean, even though technically I was the crown Prince, it’s not like I was guaranteed the throne. Almyrian traditions are a bit different than here in Fodlan.”

He’s half expecting her to throw another quip back at him about another one of the ways he’s botched this whole thing up, but to his surprise, she merely stares at him with those unwavering green eyes and nods for him to continue.

It’s now or never. He may not have been able to be completely truthful with her before, but now those obligations and promises that veiled his truths no longer bind him.

So he tells her. He tells her about his mother and how she made him promise to keep his identity a secret. He tells her about his promise to his father that he would return home to put his name in the running for the throne when it was time for his father to step down. He tells her about the fights and trials that he had to go through to beat out all the other contenders to prove his strength and abilities as a leader and King. And finally, he tells her of how he took the title of King of Almyra and how it took several weeks for him to get everything under control, only to get intelligence that Those Who Slither in the Dark were plotting one last stand, and how he barely had time to muster his army and march at full speed to make it to her side in time.

When he is finished, Byleth is silent and for a moment, he fears that perhaps it is all too much for her. There is a nasty voice in his heart of hearts, quiet though it may be, that whispers that maybe she has decided that she no longer wants to be with him because _how can she trust a man whose real name she didn’t even know_?

When he finally musters enough courage to meet her eyes again, his heart does a funny little flop in his chest and the back of his eyes burn with the familiar sting of tears.

Byleth may not be a woman of many words, but the firm squeeze of his hand and steady, soft gaze says everything he needs to know.

_**I understand. And I love you.** _

He wheezes out a chuckle and brings her hand to his lips, kissing the digits almost reverently. “I wanted to tell you before I proposed to you, but I needed to honor the promises I made to Mother and Baba. Trust me when I say the first thing I did when I went home was ask them to relieve me of those burdens.”

“Did…did they ask why?” Her voice is hesitant, even as the question leaves her tongue.

Goddess, just once he would like to be able to pull the wool over her eyes, but as usual, Teach is sharp on the uptake and Claude really cannot get anything by her.

He reaches up to finger the emerald ring hanging from a silver chain around her neck, dragging out the silence as long as possible before giving the answer he knows she is dreading.

“I maaaay have told them that I had a certain special someone in mind that I wanted to introduce them to…” His sentence trails off into laughter as he watches the horror creep into his beloved’s expression.

Byleth Eisner. The Ashen Demon. The first leader of the United Kingdom of Fodlan. The Hero of Fodlan.

Claude finds it hilarious that the woman he loves can carry such daunting titles and face an army head on with no fear, but is absolutely terrified of the idea of meeting her future in-laws.

“ _Khalid_ -” he likes the way his real name sounds coming from her lips, even if it is a horrified gasp. “-I can’t. I don’t even know what to do! I’m not a noble and I don’t know anything about etiquette on meeting royalty from a foreign country, much less your parents.”

“Aww, don’t worry Teach! You’ll be perfectly fine, just like when you joined the Alliance Round Table for the first time.” He winks at her, biting his cheek to stop the laughter that is threatening to bubble over.

“In case you’ve forgotten, I also have a country to run. One that you so gladly dumped on my lap before escaping across Fodlan’s Throat.”

She must be desperate now if she is willing to hide behind her duties.

“Not to fret, my dear.” He leans over to place a chaste peck on the tip of her nose, flashing her his signature wink and grin afterwards. “I’ve already cleared it with Seteth. After all, it was the _stress_ from the non stop work that caused you to fall ill in the first place, right? I simply proposed that you could take a month or two off from your duties to relax and recover from your injuries-”

“-I have no injuries-”

“-and maybe come back with me to Almyra for a little vacation.”

While she doesn’t officially reject his proposition, he does receive her reluctant acceptance in the form of several pillows being chucked unceremoniously at his head.


	3. Prologue: Midnight Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The night Byleth wakes up after the final battle with Those Who Slither in the Dark at Derdriu, Claude bares his heart open to his future wife.
> 
> OR
> 
> The one where Claude admits his fears to Byleth and she realizes just how much her golden boy really loves her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cross posted from my Tumblr @ThePandaPopo

“What’s wrong?” 

The hand that was stroking his cheek halts and Claude can’t help the small whine of displeasure that bubbles in his throat.

“What makes you think something is wrong?” He peeks one eye at her, studying her expression for anything that he can leverage to change the topic. 

It is his first night back with Byleth and he isn’t about to let them spend it talking about heavy topics better left for _after_ he has his way with her.

Calloused fingertips drift up along his temple and along his brow before gently smoothing it out. “You look tense.” He knows he doesn’t. He has long mastered the art of concealing his expression. “Like you’re thinking about something. Or trying not to think about something.”

Stars above. Claude wonders how he has gotten through the majority of his life without someone like Byleth. Someone who knows exactly what is going through his mind with nothing more than a quick glance. Someone who knows where to dig in his closet to find the skeletons that no one has ever even heard of.

The concerned furrow of her brows calls him and the Almyran King finds himself tangling his long fingers in her hair, angling her face so that he can brush a kiss against her forehead.

“Nothing gets past you, does it, love?” His breathy laugh tickles her skin, sending jolts of pleasure shivering down her spine.

Though his eyes remain closed after his gentle kiss, he can feel her worried gaze on his face. 

Byleth is an intense person by nature. There are not many in Fodlan that can confidently say that they could engage in eye contact with the Queen of Unification and _not_ be the first to look away.

There is something about her that pierces the soul. Like she is stripping away the masks and layers with all the ease of peeling an onion.

Claude, however, is one of the few (or possibly the only) people that grew accustomed to her intense looks and now revels in it.

Call him selfish and possessive, but Claude likes it when Byleth looks at him, and him alone.

“ _Khalid.”_

Her abrupt use of his real name sends an acute flood of joy through him and he inhales sharply. “ _Stars, By_. You can’t just say my name like that. Warn a man before you make him weak in the knees, yeah?”

God. He loves the way the syllables roll off her tongue, as if caressing the sounds before letting them escape into the space between them, absolutely dripping with love and concern. 

In giving her his real name, Claude recognizes that he has probably also given her a trump card.

And his hand? Well, it is laughable at best.

But he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I…” He combs his fingers through his unruly hair, mussed from their earlier… _ahem_ , session. “I can’t get the image of you falling out of my head.” He blurts out.

Byleth blinks at him, but he forges on, not quite ready to release control of the conversation in fear that he might chicken out and deflect.

“Byleth… When I saw you falling… I can’t- I don’t- It… It was terrifying.” Claude reaches around to pull her tightly to his chest, slotting her head securely under his chin so that she can’t see the bright sheen gathering in his eyes. 

“I know that when you woke up from your 5 year nap, I greeted you with more or less _breezy nonchalance…_ But I had nightmares about you falling off that cliff for months.”

His chest stutters with his inhale and he fights back the stinging behind his eyelids. 

“When I came back and saw you falling again… all I could think about was getting to you in time. I couldn’t save you the last time, and as a result, you disappeared for 5 years. I just… I feared that if I couldn’t save you again this time… you might-”

Despite his best efforts, the tightness in his throat chokes off the last few words of his confession.

Perhaps it is the burden of the words themselves that weigh too heavily on him that he cannot force them out. Or maybe it is because a part of him worries that if he puts words to his fear, it will make it less visceral and more tangible.

But none of that matters. 

None of it matters because her hand that was once buried against his chest is now tangling itself in his hair and coaxing his glassy eyes open.

And he can tell.

_She hears him._

**I feared that if I couldn’t save you again this time, you might disappear forever.**

It is her sad whisper of his birth name again that breaks him. Quiet sobs rack his body and he pulls her even closer, as if erasing the physical distance between them can quell the terror in his heart.

“ _Aziz-am_ …” He starts, but then curses in Almyran. His slip back to his native tongue evidence enough of how shaken he feels. “I-I can’t live without you. I know it sounds stupid and melodramatic, but in those seconds that you were falling - I couldn’t breathe. I c-couldn’t think. I couldn’t- !”

“I know. _I know, Khalid_.” Byleth hushes him, her hand making steady strokes down his back in an attempt to ease away the pain. 

“I promise… I won’t leave you. You won’t be alone ever again. We will walk side by side together in this new world.”

Both of them know that there’s no way she can make those promises. There’s too many external factors that they cannot control - what if there are attempts on her life? Goddess knows that not everyone in Fodlan is happy with the unification of the country. There are still stragglers from the Empire who are loyal to Edelgard and would do anything to see her dream realized, even without her.

Not to mention the fact that Claude can almost guarantee he will face backlash from those less tolerant in his homeland because after their marriage, there will be yet another foreigner on their throne.

But looking at her now… her own mint green eyes that are misty with _so much love and devotion_ …

Call him a fool, but he believes her.

Byleth makes a tiny startled noise when he dips down to claim her lips, but then quickly melts in his arms like an ice spell in the hot Sreng desert.

When they finally break apart, the silence of the room is broken by their quiet pants, the hot air warming up the space between them and their hearts.

“I love you, Byleth. With everything that I am.” 

He repeats the words he said to her the morning they got engaged. Not because he is being sentimental and wants that extra oomph of lovey dovey-ness, but because there are no truer words that he can think of to express just how much this beautiful woman has come to mean to him.

“I promise you… I will love you with my heart and soul until my dying breath and beyond. I will spend the rest of my life loving you because you have given me so much that I cannot even begin to repay my debts. So as long as you will have me… know that I will do everything to make your dreams come true because, _Aziz-am_ , not only have you fulfilled mine, but you’ve also given me a new one.”

Again, both of them know that this is a promise that is difficult to prove. But to Claude, he knows just as surely as his heart beats, it beats for the demigoddess that is in his arms. Without a shadow of a doubt, he knows that he will love her with every fiber of his being because it is fate that brought them together. And it is fate that ties their souls with an invisible red string.

And just as he believes her when she promises he’ll never be alone again, she believes him when he says he will always be by her side.

After all, he can do naught but follow his Guiding Star.

**Author's Note:**

> Want to know my progress on fics? Check me out on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/PopoWrites)
> 
> Sometimes [Tumblr](https://thepandapopo.tumblr.com/) will see a fic update before ao3, so be sure to follow me there as well!


End file.
